Digital signatures were developed to help solve this problem – they are, essentially, the digital equivalent to adding a notarized signature to your paperwork. Notaries today play a key role in assuring the parties of a transaction that the document is authentic and can be trusted.Īs we would suspect, the same problems exist in electronic document workflows. The existence of notaries was invented to help address these very valid concerns and can be traced all the way back to the ancient Egyptian times (according to the National Notary Association). How do I safeguard (or from the receiver’s perspective, confirm) that the content within the document hasn’t been tampered with?.Is the person who signed the document who they claim to be? Or, put another way, How can I verify if the signature is valid and hasn’t been forged?.The most common concerns individuals and organizations face when dealing with paper-based documents are: What is a Digital Signature?ĭigital Signatures are a form of electronic signatures – both are used for document signing – but there are a few important features that make them unique.īefore we go into the details, it might be helpful to take a step back for a moment and look at the security concerns surrounding paper-based documents and workflows. If you are in an industry that is highly regulated where you are dealing with personal and/or private information and data –finance or accounting, HR, legal, or healthcare, to name a few – then you might need to consider a more secure option. Electronic signatures can be used to confirm content within a document, however not all electronic signatures’ assurance levels are the same in the eyes of the law. More loosely, e-signatures are used to refer to any signature that is applied electronically as opposed to on a physical piece of paper. “Electronic sound, symbol, or process, attached to or logically associated with a contract or other record and executed or adopted by a person with the intent to sign the record." What is an Electronic Signature?Īccording to the US Federal ESIGN Act, electronic signatures are defined as: Let’s jump in and break down the differences. Here at GlobalSign, we commonly speak with organizations confused by the two options and need help determining what type of signature they should adopt into their document signing workflow. The terms electronic signatures and digital signatures are frequently used interchangeably yet there are some key differences and specific reasons for why you might use one over the other. What's in a name? In this case, quite a bit actually.
It has since been updated to include new regulations for applying e-signatures and to acomodate advances in digital signatures, including GlobalSign's cloud-based Digital Signing Service. IoT Chip to Cloud Integration Blueprintĭid you know you can automate the management and renewal of every certificate?Įditor's Note: This article was originally posted in June of 2016 by Janine Marchi.
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